NCSE moans that "only" about 10% of class time is devoted to evolution

In an article in the Annual Review of Genomics and Human Genetics, staff members of the National Center for Science Education (National Center for Selling Evolution?) whine,

. . . . . . the average amount of time devoted to evolution was only 13.7 h.. Because states typically require approximately 120–150 h of instruction for high school classes, only approximately 10% of the average high school biology class is devoted to a principle without which, in Theodosius Dobzhansky's famous phrase, nothing in biology makes sense.

The Darwinists have gone far beyond merely suppressing criticism of evolution and have been grossly and shamelessly exaggerating evolution's importance and relevance. Unfortunately, the science education standards of some states really hoke up evolution -- for example, the new Florida state standards call evolution "the fundamental concept underlying all of biology" and misdefines "theory" as being "well-supported and widely accepted"(there are strong theories and weal theories). What sane people should do is fight back at the local level -- local school boards, individual schools, and individual teachers -- to discourage implementation of such crackpot state standards.

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Darwinists fabricate a controversy in order to declare a showy victory

The National Center for Science Education has the story here. Rober Crowther comments on Evolution News & Views,

No news continues to make news. Or maybe it's agenda driven reporting making up news? Either way, this article trumpets the fact that Nebraskans need not worry that evolution will be replaced with intelligent design in science classes. Of course, that wasn't being suggested and discussed anyhow. So, here's a case of the media taking no news and goosing it into a "news" story.

Three members of the Nebraska Board of Education say they're not aware of any effort by board members or the public to include intelligent design in Nebraska's new science standards.

"I've had zero contact from anyone," said board member Robert Evnen of Lincoln, who is on a committee reviewing the standards.

Why is not being asked to do something that nobody is talking about doing worth reporting on?

I have news for those members of the Nebraska Board of Education: even in those hotbeds of creationism, Texas and Kansas, there were no organized attempts to add the words "intelligent design" to the curriculum. Instead, there were efforts to add terms like "strengths and weaknesses." Only in Dover, PA, did a naive school board offcially use the term "intelligent design." That term needs to be avoided because people immediately start asking "who is the intelligent designer," "what does the intelligent designer look like," etc..

I propose the following sensational news headline:

No Angry Mob of Bible-Pounding, Holy-Rolling Creationist Fundies with Pitchforks March on Nebraska Board of Education Demanding that Evolution be Replaced with Biblical Creationism

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Evolution is religion

Larry Moran's Sandwalk blog has the following excerpt from a talk given by Darwinist cafeteria Christian Francis Collins:

Here's a video of a talk he gave last October at The Veritas Forum in California. All of it is really interesting but the punchline comes at 50 minutes when he gives a short summary of his beliefs.

[First Slide] Almighty God, who is not limited in space and time, created a universe 13.7 billion years ago with its parameters precisely tuned to allow the development of complexity over long periods of time.

[Second Slide] God's plan included the mechanism of evolution to create the marvelous diversity of living things on our planet. Most especially, that plan included human beings.

[Third Slide] After evolution, in the fullness of time, had prepared a sufficiently advanced neurological "house" (the brain), God gifted humanity with free will and with a soul. Thus humans received a special status, "made in God's image."

[Fourth Slide] We humans used our free will to disobey God, leading to our realization of being in violation of the Moral Law. Thus we were estranged from God. For Christians, Jesus is the solution to that estrangement.

That's it. A very simple but, I think, entirely compatible view that does no violence either to faith or to science. And puts them in a harmonious position ...

So Collins leaves no question that evolution is part of his religious beliefs. Furthermore, he appears to be arguing that evolution must be true because it is the method that God chose for creating living things. In contrast, most or many advocates of Intelligent Design are very careful to avoid religious arguments. So, why is teaching Intelligent Design in public schools a violation of the "separation of church and state" whereas teaching Collins' evolution is not? The answer, of course, will be that evolution can be taught without mention of religious beliefs, but the same is true of ID. William Jennings Bryan said, "If those who teach Darwinism and evolution, as applied to man, insist that they are neither agnostics nor atheists, but are merely interpreting the Bible differently from orthodox Christians, what right have they to ask that their interpretation be taught at public expense?"

This jerko Collins is a darling of the hypocritical accommodationist National Center for Science Education, one of the biggest opponents of teaching criticisms of evolution in the public schools. Furthermore, this jerko Collins was appointed by Pres. Obama to be head of the National Institute of Health, probably a political appointment based on Collins' beliefs about evolution.

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Long-overdue symposium on "Intelligent Design and the Constitution"

Casey Luskin posted on Evolution News & Views,

Tomorrow, Tuesday November 10th, University of St. Thomas School of Law is hosting a legal symposium titled “Intelligent Design and the Constitution.” Participants include Peter M. J. Hess (NCSE), David DeWolf [not listed on website] (Professor of Law, Gonzaga University; senior fellow, Discovery Institute), Josh Rosenau [not listed on website] (NCSE), Thomas D. Sullivan (Aquinas Chair in Philosophy and Theology, University of St. Thomas), Patrick Gillen (Lead Defense Counsel, Kitzmiller v. Dover), Russell Pannier (Emeritus Professor of Law, William Mitchel College of the Law), and myself. The title of my talk will be “The Constitutionality and Pedagogical Benefits of Teaching Evolution Scientifically.” According to the website:

The symposium, free and open to the public, will bring together scholars to debate and analyze various constitutional and philosophical issues surrounding evolutionism and intelligent design, particularly as they affect U.S. public schools.
For details, visit here.

IMO this symposium is long overdue -- a lot of issues need more airing. There has been too much misrepresentation of the issues -- such misrepresentation is epitomized by the Darwinist epithet "intelligent design creationism."
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I am as opposed as anyone to the outright teaching of religion-based creationism in public school science classes. However, to me it does not matter whether or not intelligent design or other scientific (or pseudoscientific) criticisms of evolution theory are "good" science, because there are good secular reasons for teaching criticisms of evolution that are bad science. Some such reasons are: (1) encouraging critical thinking, (2) broadening students' education, (3) preventing and correcting misconceptions, (4) increasing student interest, and (5) helping to assure that criticisms of evolution are taught by qualified science teachers (the Darwinists complain that these criticisms "mislead" students but want these criticisms to be taught only by unqualified teachers!). There is no constitutional principle of separation of bad science and state. The Constitution's establishment clause is being misused to suppress scientific criticisms of evolution theory.

I look forward to the results of the symposium.
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Eugenie Scott the Darwinist crackpot

Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education (familiarly called "Genie" by name-droppers like Fatheaded Ed Brayton), wrote in the US News and World Report,

Anyone who honestly examines the data supporting evolution — even a young-earth creationist — concludes that the science is strong. If you reject evolution, you are doing it for religious reasons. You're entitled to your religious opinions — but not to your own scientific facts.

I find it hard to believe that even she would say something like that: "If you reject evolution, you are doing it for religious reasons."

There is little or no dispute over "scientific facts" -- most of the dispute is over interpretation of scientific facts.

It is sad that Eugenie Scott is probably the most honored Darwinist activist, receiving honorary degrees and other awards. Darwinist activists like Richard Dawkins and PZ Myers generally don't get awards but IMO are far more honest.
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The NCSE has a paid "faith project director" but is actually a very poor, one-sided source of information about the conflict between evolution and religion. For example, the NCSE website does not tell the following facts: (1) That the major Christian sects Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, and to a lesser extent the Mormon Church have taken official positions against evolution theory; (2) a Pew Forum survey showed that only 8% of Jehovah's witnesses "agree that evolution is the best explanation for the origins of human life on earth"; (3) Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams called evolution theory "pseudoscience" [link] [link]; and (4) Cardinal Christophe Schönborn, former chief editor of the Catholic catechism, favors intelligent design. The NCSE website's one-sidedness on the evolution v. religion controversy was even part of the cause of action of an establishment clause lawsuit, Caldwell v. Caldwell (in the homepage sidebar's list of post-label links).
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Stupidity of the term "intelligent design creationism"

Nick Matzke wrote on Panda's Thumb,

Just last week over at the Thinking Christian blog there was a huge stink raised over the alleged inappropriateness of linking ID to creationism. After much argument the anti-linkage people more or less conceded that there were some good reasons to link ID to a somewhat generic definition of creationism (relying on special creation), but still protested loudly about how inappropriate it was to make the linkage, because most people (allegedly) would assume that creationism = young-earth creationism, and linking ID to young-earth creationism was oh-so-wildly unfair.

No, the "huge stink" was not "over the alleged inappropriateness of linking ID to creationism" -- the huge stink was over the term "ID creationism," which represents the notion that ID and creationism are so intimately linked that ID cannot or should not be mentioned without also mentioning creationism in the same breath. Tom Gilson wrote on his Thinking Christian blog,
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Several times in the last few days the term “Intelligent Design Creationism” has crossed my line of sight. It’s a misnomer, a duct-taped concatenation of concepts that overlap somewhat, but not enough to merit being stuck together the way ID opponents have done. Robert Pennock is perhaps the worst, but Barbara Forrest, Richard Dawkins, and P.Z. Myers are also frequent offenders.

Gilson did not say that ID and creationism are not linked -- he said that they are "concepts that overlap somewhat, but not enough to merit being stuck together the way ID opponents have done." Evolution has been linked to atheism, sometimes by evolutionists themselves (Richard Dawkins said that evolution theory made it possible to be an "intellectually fulfilled atheist"), but people do not regularly use the term "evolution atheism" or something similar. The term "intelligent design creationism" is just plain asinine.

I don't know if Judge "Jackass" Jones actually uses the term "ID creationism," but he should be added to the list of offenders because he ruled in Kitzmiller v. Dover that "ID cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents."
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Why Darwinist cafeteria Christians are "implacable foes" of ID

William Dembski wrote,

Howard Van Till’s review of my book No Free Lunch exemplifies perfectly why theistic evolution remains intelligent design’s most implacable foe. Not only does theistic evolution sign off on the naturalism that pervades so much of contemporary science, but it justifies that naturalism theologically -- as though it were unworthy of God to create by any means other than an evolutionary process that carefully conceals God’s tracks.

Here are some reasons why Darwinist cafeteria Christians -- people who take the gospel literally but do not take the bible's creation story literally -- are "implacable foes" of ID:

(1) They are bending over backwards to try to appease the atheistic Darwinist establishment.

(2) They try to justify their inconsistency -- i.e., the inconsistency of accepting the gospel while rejecting the creation story -- by claiming that they are obliged to reject the creation story because the scientific evidence for evolution is airtight. With this position, they cannot afford to admit that evolution has any scientific weaknesses at all.

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Desperate Darwinists play with words to promote Darwinism

-- from an interview for ScienceNews:

Interviewer: So you urge scientists not to say that they “believe” in evolution?!

Eugenie Scott: Right. What your audience hears is more important than what you say.… What [people] hear is that evolution is a belief, it’s an opinion, it’s not well-substantiated science. And that is something that scientists need to avoid communicating.

You believe in God. You believe your sports team is going to win. But you don’t believe in cell division. You don’t believe in thermodynamics. Instead, you might say you “accept evolution.”

However, "belief" does not necessarily mean blind faith. Should the expression "seeing is believing" be changed to "seeing is accepting"? Should John 20:29 be changed as follows: "Jesus said to him, Thomas, because you have seen me, you have believed accepted: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed" ?

Darwinists have also played with the word "theory." Darwinists object to the idea of calling evolution a "theory" because the colloquial meaning of "theory" is a "guess" or "hunch." So in the new Florida standards for science education, the Darwinists defined "scientific theories" as being "well-supported" and "widely accepted," but that is ridiculous -- there are strong scientific theories and weak scientific theories. The dumb Darwinists have only added to the confusion about the meaning of "theory," particularly "scientific theory."

Another example of Darwinists playing with words is their oxymoronic term "intelligent design creationism." This term creates confusion because intelligent design and creationism are distinct because the former is based on scientific observation and reasoning whereas the latter is based on religious sources. Darwinists don't even explain why they find it necessary to add the term "creationism" to "intelligent design" if they think that there is no kind of ID that is not creationist.

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Quote of the day:
" "If man evolved from monkeys, then why are there still monkeys?’...That’s probably the second most common question I get on talk radio."
-- Eugenie Scott, executive director of the National Center for Science Education, in interview for ScienceNews

I wonder what the most common question is.
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Darwinian atheist stonewalling

Darwinian atheists (my new name for Darwinists -- or evolutionists) are no longer even paying lip service to the idea of open debate about Darwinian atheism. Cornelius Hunter wrote,

Once upon a time scientists were supposed to be skeptical. Scientific theories, we were taught, were to be questioned. . . . .Scientists were to be objective, and to follow the evidence where ever it may lead.

Those days are gone — long gone. Misleading the public, covering up evidence, protecting theories — that is all standard fare today. We have now arrived at the sad state where evidence that is contrary to evolution — any contrary evidence — is not allowed. Consider this recent exchange between Yudhijit Bhattacharjee of Science magazine and evolution crusader Eugenie Scott:

Science magazine: How has this battle changed in the past 20 years?

Eugenie Scott: The enemy has become more diverse. When I started, it was just creation science. Now we have creation science, intelligent design [ID], and straight-up antievolution in the form of "evidence against evolution."

Evidence against evolution? Is there something wrong with that? Yes, there is for evolutionists.

I have encountered Darwinian atheist stonewalling in my attempts to present my ideas about coevolution [link]. My presentations of those ideas have been met almost entirely with scoffing, impromptu just-so stories, bibliography bluffing (just aimlessly pointing to literature), general filibustering, and censorship. The bloggers at the Florida Citizens for Science actually banned me from posting my ideas about coevolution on their blog unless those ideas are approved by "experts" in advance![link] Who ever heard of such a thing? I could see the point of requiring pre-approval of my ideas if those ideas required some specialized, esoteric knowledge, e.g., knowledge of advanced mathematics, but my ideas about coevolution are easily understood by laypeople. The Darwinian atheists bury their heads in the sand because they can't believe -- or pretend that they can't believe -- that anyone could come up with reasonable criticisms of Darwinian atheism.
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Two new websites about evolution & religion

There are two big new websites about the issue of evolution and religion: faith + evolution, run by the pro-ID Discovery Institute, and The BioLogos Foundation. I will comment here about the BioLogos website because that website seems especially confusing and ambiguous.

The BioLogos website leans towards theistic evolution (The Questions):

1. How is BioLogos different from Theistic Evolution, Intelligent Design and Creationism?
BioLogos is most similar to Theistic Evolution. Theism is the belief in a God who cares for and interacts with the creation. Theistic Evolution, therefore, is the belief that evolution is the way by which God created life.

BioLogos defines "evolution" as follows:
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2. What is evolution?
Simply put, the term evolution means a change over time. For example, one might say that laptop computers have evolved over the past decade. But when biologists use the term, they refer to the entire history of life on Earth.

IMO that is an incomplete definition of the term "evolution." The Latin root for "evolve" means "unrolling" or "unfolding," so the term "evolution" implies development, improvement or a pattern of change (e.g., the evolution of stars), as distinguished from random change.

BioLogos says,

Intelligent Design

Contrary to some interpretations, Intelligent Design, or ID, makes no specific theological claims.

LOL. Tell that to that stupid bozo Judge "Jackass" Jones!

BioLogos continues,

l Proponents of ID only argue that “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."

BioLogos is quoting the Discovery Institute here. IMO the term "intelligent design" is unfortunate because it implies the existence of an "intelligent" -- possibly supernatural -- designer and because it implies that some living things were "intelligently designed" or are the result of intelligent causes. To me, ID is just the study of whether the combination of natural genetic variation and natural selection is sufficient to account for the complexity and diversity of living things.

This definition can be confusing because Theistic Evolutionists also believe an intelligent being created the world.

There is little difference between Michael Behe's ID and Ken Miller's theistic evolution, but Judge "Jackass" Jones ruled that the former is unconstitutional but the latter is not.

Theistic Evolutionists, however, also believe evolution by natural selection is the process God used to create. Although advocates of ID do not disagree that evolution is change over time, they deny the biological process of evolution by natural selection could account for the present complexity of life forms on Earth.

More than just natural selection is needed -- genetic variation is also needed. And many ID advocates do not deny the effectiveness of natural selection -- they only deny that natural causes are sufficient to produce the necessary genetic variation.
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Islamic creationist condemns Intelligent Design

That stupid ignoramus Judge "Jackass" Jones said in Kitzmiller v. Dover, "ID cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents." Darwinists use the oxymoronic term "intelligent design creationism." Darwinists, who cherry-pick their evidence instead of looking at all the evidence, harp on the typo "cdesignproponentists" -- an error in substituting the term "design proponent" for "creationist" in the book "Of Pandas and People." Ironically, many religious creationists reject intelligent design. One of the reasons why they reject ID is that they feel that god's word does not need scientific evidence to support it. Some creationists feel that it is blasphemous to even imply or suggest that god's word needs scientific evidence to support it. One of the main reasons why Darwinists insist that ID is creationism is to have a basis for using the establishment clause to attack ID.

Adrian Oktar, who writes under the pen name Harun Yahya, is a very prominent Turkish creationist.[1] [2] [3] [4] He wrote,

INTELLIGENT DESIGN: A NEW AGE THEORY

In order to alienate people from true religions, Masons have devised many false religions of complex description assembling them all under the heading New Age.

Their purpose in this is to inculcate in that large segment of people who are abandoning materialist ideas, a new way of living and thinking. They want to establish a new system ornamented with metaphysical language and totally divergent from the true religion and faith in Allah (God) as revealed in the Qur’an. It is an irresponsible system with nothing to offer.

. . . . .In order to alienate people in Islamic countries from true religion, Masons are intent on offering the idea of intelligent design as the most appropriate alternative in these countries.

Of course, they do not pretend that what they are doing is against Islam; on the contrary, they claim that their activities are innocent and even serve to strengthen the foundations of faith in Allah.

However, Western supporters of this movement confess that this is a non-religious system of thought. For example, the American biologist, Michael Behe, one of the noted theoreticians of intelligent design, explains that intelligent design is not an idea based in religion but religious people can make good use of it in their arguments.

Those who accept the theory of intelligent design insist that religion and science should be separate and that science should not support creation and revealed religions.

Yahya (Adrian Oktar) contradicts himself here -- first he said that ID guru Michael Behe holds that "religious people can make good use of [ID] in their arguments," and then says, "those who accept ID insist that religion and science should be separate and that science should not support creation and revealed religions."

Yahya/Oktar then attacks the Discovery Institute:
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They see themselves as outside revealed religions; they think that religion is a matter of faith and outside the parameters of science. Their view is that it would be wrong for science to rely on religion.

The official internet site of the Discovery Institute that represents this movement asks the question. ‘Is the theory of intelligent design the same as the theory of creation?’ The answer:

Unlike creationism, the scientific theory of intelligent design is agnostic regarding the source of design and has no commitment to defending Genesis, the Bible or any other sacred text. (http://www.discovery.org/csc/topQuestions.php#questionsAboutIntelligentDesign)

However, in a post last year, the very popular blog "Little Green Footballs" accused the Discovery Institute of being in league with Turkish creationists, including Yahya/Oktar! [link] LOL

Yahya writes,

The Theory of Intelligent Design: Another Kind of Deism.

The theory of intelligent design accepts neither revealed religions nor the existence of Allah. It has an abstract and abstruse concept of a designer.

It is misleading to say that ID accepts neither revealed religions nor the existence of Allah -- or some other god(s) or goddess(es). It is more correct to say that ID does not reject revealed religions or the existence of Allah. There is a big difference.

It is interesting that Masons use the same logic in their writings when they say that the universe is like the intelligent designer -- total conscious energy. They say this energy is conscious and that it is the Great Architect of the Universe.

But Masons insist that that this conscious energy is not Allah. (Surely Allah is beyond that)

We can see that advocates of intelligent design share the same logic as Masons when it comes to explaining their position. Their ideas are very much in tune with Deism which accepts the existence of a Creator while rejecting the validity of revealed religions.

ID may be "in tune" with Deism, but that doesn't mean that ID is the same as Deism or is a kind of Deism. ID is a "big tent" with room for those who believe in Deism, young-earth creationism, old-earth creationism, common descent, front-loaded (pre-programmed) evolution, theism, agnosticism, atheism (yes), etc..

In contrast to Yahya/Oktar, the young-earth creationist organization Answers-in-Genesis appears to support ID -- the AiG website praises Ben Stein's pro-ID movie "Expelled -- No Intelligence Allowed" and sells a DVD of the movie. [link].

More discussion is on Panda's Thumb and Uncommon Descent.
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Debunking the "intelligent design creationism" myth

The term "intelligent design creationism" epitomizes the Darwinists' efforts to conflate intelligent design with biblical creationism. This conflation was debunked in an excellent article by journalist Melanie Phillips, who said,

I hold no particular brief for ID, but am intrigued by the ideas it raises and want it to be given a fair crack of the whip to see where the argument will lead. What I have also seen, however, is an attempt to shut down that argument by distorting and misrepresenting ID and defaming and intimidating its proponents.

One way of doing so is to conflate ID with Creationism. I wrote below [i.e., previously] that this is wrong, since ID comes out of science and creationism comes out of Biblical literalism. This provoked Charles Johnson on LGF [Little Green Footballs] to accuse me of being either duped or dishonest. Johnson – who has become unhealthily obsessed with ID and Creationism in recent months -- says I am wrong to say that ID is based on science rather than on religion, and wrong to say that it is different from Creationism . . . .
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To repeat – I have no particular brief for ID. I am not in a position to judge whether its arguments about ‘irreducible complexity’ and the logic of intelligent design are soundly based or not. But I do know that the attempt to shut down this debate runs against every principle of rationality and scientific freedom; and that the claim that it is rooted not in science but in religious fundamentalism is a falsehood designed to smear and intimidate people into silence . . . .

Dogma is certainly what is on the other side of ID in this fight – a materialist dogma which, posing as the standard-bearer of reason against obscurantism, actually embodies irrationality and a kind of intellectual fascism. It is a secular inquisition – as the reaction to my [previous] post makes all too plain.

Intelligent design is indeed based on scientific evidence and scientific reasoning -- there is nothing in the bible about irreducible complexity, bacterial flagella, the blood-clotting cascade, etc..

The Darwinists' claim that ID is not science because ID proponents have not conducted a lot of experiments is of course wrong. A lot of science is not experimentation but is analysis of existing data -- my studies of coevolution are like that. I have done no experiments and made no field trips in my studies of coevolution.

The Darwinists' charges of guilt-by-association -- that many ID proponents are motivated by religion -- are also improper. Indeed, when it comes to guilt-by-association, the Darwinists live in a glass house because so many Darwinists are (1) atheists and (2) cafeteria Christians who are inconsistent about supernaturalism because they believe the supernatural gospel story but reject the supernatural creation story.

One of the main reasons why Darwinists insist that intelligent design is religion is to enable them to use the Constitution's establishment clause to attack it.

Instead of looking at all the evidence, the Darwinists cherry-pick their evidence, like the following guy who was on trial on a charge of stealing chickens:

Defendant to witness: Did you see me go into the henhouse?

Witness: Yes

Defendant: Did you see me come out of the henhouse?

Witness: No

Defendant: Aha! Ise still in that henhouse!

The full story of the debate is here.
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Staff is damaging U. of Vermont's reputation

The University of Vermont is one of eight original "Public Ivies"[1]:

In 1985 author Richard Moll coined the term "Public Ivies" in his book The Public Ivies: America's Flagship Undergraduate Colleges. At that time, Moll identified eight universities as public institutions that "provide an Ivy League collegiate experience at a public school price." The eight universities Moll named were the College of William and Mary, Miami University of Ohio, the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Michigan, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Texas, the University of Vermont, and the University of Virginia[1]

Who knew? However, it now appears that UVM's hard-earned reputation is being damaged by the Ben Stein scandal. A Feb. 6 editorial in the Burlington Free Press said,

Fogel's Stein flip-flop embarrassing for UVM

The University of Vermont took a hit coming and going in the flap over Ben Stein as this year's commencement speaker, inviting, then withdrawing the invitation over his views questioning evolution. The invitation shows a stunning degree of tone deafness on the part of UVM President Dan Fogel to the social and political currents on his own campus. The decision to withdraw the invitation opens the university to charges that the university is less than open to controversial views

The Discovery Institute's Casey Luskin wrote in the US News & World Report,
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Unfortunately, the bluffs and authoritarian tactics of Darwinists create a climate of intolerance that leads to discrimination against academics and educators who dissent from neo-Darwinism.

The latest example took place last week when economist, comedian, and Darwin skeptic Ben Stein withdrew from offering the spring commencement address at the University of Vermont because, as the Chronicle of Higher Education put it, "his invitation drew complaints about his views on biological evolution."

The main instigator of complaints against Stein was University of Minnesota Morris biologist P.Z. Myers, who in 2005 demanded "the public firing and humiliation of some teachers" who support ID or doubt Darwinism. This time, Myers incited his blog's followers against Stein, proclaiming that "it's a real slap in the face for the university to drag in this disgrace who has been a figurehead for a movement that is trying to replace science with superstition."

The truth about Stein's withdrawal has leaked out in media interviews where UVM's President Dan Fogel made it clear that ID proponents deserve second-class treatment. Parroting Myers's rhetoric, Fogel was quoted saying, "It's an issue about the appropriateness of awarding an honorary degree to someone whose views in many ways ignore or affront the fundamental values of scientific inquiry."

Fogel's statement is simply a pretext for discriminating against scholars who hold a minority scientific viewpoint. The reality is that Fogel has demonstrated plain old intolerance for academics that support ID.

Like many persecutors, Fogel appears blind to his own prejudices. He thus added, "This is not, to my mind, an issue about academic freedom." But Fogel's actions refute his own words: The very fact that he won't give an honorary degree to a scholar because of that scholar's support for ID demonstrates the lack of academic freedom for ID proponents in the academy.

Instead of just graciously accepting Ben Stein's withdrawal, Pres. Fogel made matters much worse by publicly stating reasons why Stein does not deserve an honorary degree.

Later, a UVM biology professor, Nick Gotelli, said in an op ed,

Naturally, the biology department and many others would never invite Stein to speak on our campus. However, one of the best ways to refute intellectually bankrupt ideas is to expose them to the light of day. There is nothing I could say to my biology classes that would discredit Stein's ideas more than his own words on evolution, science, Nazis and the Holocaust. For this reason, universities and campuses throughout the United States occasionally invite "controversial" speakers, and we at UVM fully support this kind of free speech.

But inviting a campus lecturer is different from choosing a commencement speaker and awarding an honorary degree. The real issue is not political correctness, but scholarship. I will leave it to my colleagues in the economics department to weigh in on Stein's scholastic achievements as an economist. As far as the sciences go, I am unaware of a single publication by Stein that has appeared in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. In the sciences,

The Discovery Institute's David Klinghoffer responded to the preceding op-ed by sending Potelli an email proposing an ID debate at UVM and proposed ID experts David Berlinski and Stephen Meyer as alternatives or additions to Stein. Potelli sent Klinghoffer a nasty refusal. The copies of their emails are here on Sleazy PZ Myers' blog. Klinghoffer said,

Ben Stein may not be the best person to single-handedly represent the ID side. As you're aware, he's known mainly as an entertainer. A more appropriate alternative or addition might be our senior fellows David Berlinski or Stephen Meyer, respectively a mathematician and a philosopher of science.

So Klinghoffer called Potelli's bluff by offering him the opportunity to discredit not just Stein but real ID experts Berlinski and/or Meyer, and Potelli chickened out. Klinghoffer's discussion of the incident is here.
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Screwed-up book from the National Center for Science Education

An NCSE website article about a new book, "Evolution v. Creationism: An Introduction, 2nd Edition," by Eugenie Scott, says,

Evolution education is being battered every day in school districts across the U.S. by creationists, whether they're pushing young-earth creationism, intelligent design, or antievolutionism in the guise of "academic freedom."

Not all of the batterers are creationists.

What's going on here?

Good question.

Why is the United States the only country where teaching evolution is so controversial?

Wrong -- see this blog's articles about the evolution controversies abroad -- these articles are in two post-label groups listed in the sidebar of the homepage. How can the NCSE claim to have expertise in this area while being ignorant of such basic facts about the subject?

Why are scientists so sure that evolution is good science?

Some scientists are not so sure.

Are people of faith truly unable to accept the central principle of modern biology?

There we go again with that "evolution is central to biology" bullshit. Sheeesh.

Is it really "fair" for creationism to be taught alongside evolution?

One thing is for sure and that it is that it is "fair" to teach scientific and pseudoscientific criticisms of evolution alongside evolution.

What have the courts said?

It's not all bad, but a lot of it is bad -- very bad.

And will attacks on evolution ultimately undermine not only American education but American competitiveness?

K-12 evolution education has nothing to do with American competitiveness.

Updated, revamped, and expanded, the 2nd edition adds another 70 pages of brand new and revised material, including:

A new foreword by U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III, who ruled in the landmark Kitzmiller v. Dover case.

This has got to be the living end. Probably some crap about "judicial independence."

A new chapter on testing intelligent design and evidence against evolution in the courts.

The courts should rule that the scientific merits of both evolution and criticisms of evolution are non-justiciable. A question is considered non-justiciable when there is "a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving the question." Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 U.S. 267 (2004). If necessary, Congress should use its power under the Constitution's Article III to strip the Supreme Court of appellate jurisdiction over scientific questions in the evolution controversy (with the exception of Supreme Court rulings that such questions are non-justiciable).

Evolution vs. Creationism is the perfect resource for teachers, professors, libraries, and anybody who wants to learn about the perennial creationism/evolution controversy.

It is also an extremely biased resource that needs to be balanced with opposing material.

The book did get some praise from a leading creationist:

Henry M. Morris in the Institute for Creation Research's Back to Genesis:

I believe that she has conscientiously tried to be objective in discussing this inflammatory subject in her book. ... The book is well written and creationists can read it with interest and appreciation, even though its arguments for evolution are — to us, at least — speculative and even defensive.

The book may be OK for creationists, but it is certainly not OK for supporters of scientific criticisms of evolution. Even the book's title, "Evolution v. Creationism," is biased, because as I indicated, creationism is not the only idea opposed to evolution.
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New Florida Intelligent Design bill

A news article says,

Amid much controversy a year ago, the Florida Board of Education approved new standards that require public schools to teach that the scientific theory of evolution is the foundation of all biological science.. . . .

That's true -- the new state science standards call evolution "the fundamental concept underlying all of biology."

State Sen. Stephen Wise, a Jacksonville Republican, said he plans to introduce a bill to require teachers who teach evolution to also discuss the idea of intelligent design . . . .

. . . . Wise, the chief sponsor of the bill, expects the Senate to take it up when it meets in March. He said its intent is simple: "If you're going to teach evolution, then you have to teach the other side so you can have critical thinking."

Wise said that if the Legislature passes the bill, he wouldn't be surprised if there's a legal challenge.

"You just never know. They use the courts all the time. I guess if they have enough money they can get it in the courts," he said. "Someplace along the line you've got to be able to make a value judgment of what it is you think is the appropriate thing."

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The bill should be passed if for no other reason than to invite lawsuits that would give an opportunity to overturn or counteract the infamous Kitzmiller v. Dover decision, which is over three years old. Kitzmiller was decided by an activist judge who said that his decision was based on his cockamamie notion that the Founders based the establishment clause upon a belief that organized religions are not "true" religions -- he said,

. . . .this much is very clear. The Founders believed that true religion was not something handed down by a church or contained in a Bible, but was to be found through free, rational inquiry. At bottom then, this core set of beliefs led the Founders, who constantly engaged and questioned things, to secure their idea of religious freedom by barring any alliance between church and state.

IMO the courts should declare the evolution controversy to be non-justiciable. If necessary, Congress should use its power under the Constitution's Article III to strip the Supreme Court of appellate jurisdiction over questions concerning the scientific merits of evolution and criticisms of evolution.

Some of the comments under the above news article are really incredible. A comment titled "The stupidity burns" says,

Only a scientifically illiterate hick would call any scientific theory "only a theory". In science a theory is the highest level of understanding. A scientific theory is higher than an hypothesis, higher than a law, even higher than facts.

And a comment titled "The problem is the Christian death cult" gushes, .

The basic facts of evolutionary biology are the strongest facts of science. The evidence is so massive, so powerful, and growing so rapidly, it's virtually impossible to find a biologist who doesn't love evolution. It's virtually impossible to find a biologist who doesn't agree with this famous quote: "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution." To properly teach biology, evolution must be a major part of every single lesson every single day.

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The hypocrisy of theistic evolutionism

A New Republic article by Jerry Coyne says of theistic evolutionists Karl Giberson and Kenneth Miller, authors of Saving Darwin and Only a Theory respectively,

Together, "Saving Darwin" and "Only a Theory" provide an edifying summary of the tenets and the flaws of modern creationism, the former dealing mainly with its history and the latter with its specious claims. If these books stopped there, they would raise a valuable alarm about the dangers facing American science and culture. But in the end their sincere but tortuous efforts to find the hand of God in evolution lead them to solutions that are barely distinguishable from the creationism that they deplore . . .(page 1)

If rational scientific evolution theory is sufficient to explain the diversity of life, then why did Giberson and Miller find it necessary to add a supernatural explanation, "the hand of God"?
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. . . . Miller opts for theology. Although his new book does not say how God ensured the arrival of Homo sapiens, Miller was more explicit in "Finding Darwin's God." There he suggested that the indeterminacy of quantum mechanics allows God to intervene at the level of atoms, influencing events on a larger scale:

The indeterminate nature of quantum events would allow a clever and subtle God to influence events in ways that are profound, but scientifically undetectable to us. Those events could include the appearance of mutations, the activation of individual neurons in the brain, and even the survival of individual cells and organisms affected by the chance processes of radioactive decay.

In other words, God is a Mover of Electrons, deliberately keeping his incursions into nature so subtle that they're invisible. It is baffling that Miller, who comes up with the most technically astute arguments against irreducible complexity, can in the end wind up touting God's micro-editing of DNA. This argument is in fact identical to that of Michael Behe, the ID advocate against whom Miller testified in the Harrisburg trial[Kitzmiller v. Dover].(emphasis added) It is another God-of-the-gaps argument, except that this time the gaps are tiny. . . . .(page 4)

The idea that "Goddidit" is synonymous with the idea of "God-of-the-gaps."

I have wondered why Michael Behe's Intelligent Design is often considered to be a violation of the constitutional principle of separation of church and state while Kenneth Miller's theistic evolutionism is not, even though the two are often virtually indistinguishable.

Although Giberson and Miller see themselves as opponents of creationism, in devising a compatibility between science and religion they finally converge with their opponents. In fact, they exhibit at least three of the four distinguishing traits of creationists: belief in God, the intervention of God in nature, and a special role for God in the evolution of humans. They may even show the fourth trait, a belief in irreducible complexity, by proposing that a soul could not have evolved, but was inserted by God . . .

Accepting both science and conventional faith leaves you with a double standard: rational on the origin of blood clotting, irrational on the Resurrection; rational on dinosaurs, irrational on virgin births. Without good cause, Giberson and Miller pick and choose what they believe. At least the young-earth creationists are consistent, for they embrace supernatural causation across the board. (page 6)

Maybe this "double standard" could be called "Cafeteria Christianity." Anyway, I don't agree with Coyne's notion that all criticisms of evolution are irrational.
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Complex, contentious scientific questions should be declared non-justiciable

There is a big blog debate between Casey Luskin [1] and Ken Miller [2] now going on over the question of the irreducible complexity of the blood-clotting cascade, one of the questions in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Intelligent Design case. This scientific question is obviously so complex and contentious that it should be declared to be non-justiciable. It is like the proverbial question of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. And this is only one of several complex and contentious scientific questions that Judge Jones had to deal with in the Dover case. And because of the large amounts of court time wasted on high-profile cases, the courts give short shrift or no shrift to low-profile cases. In courts' allocations of time to different cases, the losses of the many fund the payoffs for the lucky few, just like at any honest racetrack.

There is no constitutional principle of separation of bad science and state.

Ken Miller wrote,

But there is something very strange, and even distressing, about Luskin’s contention that the obvious failings of the arguments in Pandas ["Of Pandas and People," the ID book purchased by the Dover Area school board] are somehow less important than the ones in DBB ["Darwin's Black Box" by Michael Behe]. Why is it OK to give high school readers an argument about the irreducible complexity of the entire cascade that you know to be false (as Luskin admits), just as long as you modify that argument in another book? Luskin seems to have forgotten that the Dover trial was about an issue much more important than the fate of ID…. It was about what should be taught to high school science students.

So what Miller is really saying here is that the Dover school board purchased the wrong ID book -- the board should have purchased "Darwin's Black Box" instead.

And Miller tries to use a 2008 scientific paper to defend a 2005 court decision:

[Russell Doolittle's] 2008 paper [Doolittle et al, 2008] reports on a careful search through the lamprey genome. The lamprey, as luck would have it, has a perfectly functional clotting system, and it lacks not only the three factors missing in jawed fish, but also Factors IX and V.

Panda's Thumb also has an article about the debate.
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Comment thread for Intelligent Design and Irreducible Complexity

NOTICE --

I have placed a new post on the general subject of Intelligent Design. I did not want to create confusion by having two threads on the same subject, but I felt it was best to make a new post. Copies of comments or complete discussions already posted on this thread are of course welcome under my new post. I am leaving this thread open for those who wish to continue their discussions here.

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I am establishing this thread for the benefit of those who wish to discuss ID or IC on this blog. Apparently there is a need for some neutral ground where commenters who have been censored by other blogs may freely discuss these issues. The establishment of this thread is not meant to discourage the discussion of ID or IC when appropriate in the contexts of other threads. Also, this thread is not like Panda's Thumb's infamous "Bathroom Wall" -- comments discussing ID and/or IC in other threads will never be moved here.

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